Waves
by hell-whim
Summary: Change rolls past and through them, threads tangling and twining together, unbreakable. Or so they all thought. Mid S.1 AU --ON SEMI-PERMANENT HIATUS
1. Prologue

**Title:** Waves

**Author:** freak-pudding

**Disclaimer:** _Heroes_ is the property of NBC International and Tim Kring. No copyright infringement intended.

**Summary:** Change rolls past and through them, threads tangling and twining together, unbreakable. Or so they all thought.

**Author's Notes:** Prologue was just gut reaction to watching _Homecoming_ the first time around. AU, I guess? Claire definitely isn't Nathan's kid in this one. Expect rambliness and lack of cohesive posting schedule. That is all.

**Prologue**

Mohinder has a list at the bottom of his bag, of all the people he wants to apologize to.

It is extensive and detailed; a person's name is followed by the time, date, and particular nature of the offense. Some names have small marks at the side, to indicate the number of times he _could_ have apologized, but chose not to. Some are smudged, old and crossed-out for new names, new offenses. Almost half are circled in bright red pen, a few less in orange, and the rest in dark green.

He'd gotten bored one night, correcting his students' exams, and he thought the list could use some organization. If anything, his color scheme only made matters worse.

The lines arc up and down the page, splintering, intersecting—two incidents represented by the same color, because they involve the same person or the same circumstances. Some lines fall into each other, weaving up and down, crooked straight lines that meet and diverge. Several lines pass through a crosshatch of dark blue: some stop within, others continue on.

This dark patch is halfway down the page; it represents his father's death.

At the bottom of the paper, it says simply _Peter Petrelli_.

"All passengers, Flight 48, now boarding."

His father had given him the idea first—he remembers, when he was a child, the sheaves of parchment piled along the back of his father's office wall taller than he'd been. He'd tried reading them sometimes, but the names were written in letters he hadn't mastered.

_"Papa? What are these?"_

_"It is a list, Mohinder."_

_"Of what, Papa?"_

_"Of the many wrongs I must right."_

He rises and shuffles into line slowly, casting a brief eye around the terminal, and hands his boarding pass across the counter. Los Angeles is sweltering, even by his standards, and he can feel the hot air spill across his face from the poorly latched walkway.

"You got family waiting for you?"

"I'm sorry?"

"I said, do you have family waiting for you?"

Mohinder stares, the reflexive response not quite making it to his spine. The woman asking is bottle-blonde, face microwaved to a wrinkled, burnished orange. She has no interest in his answer.

"No," he sputters, after a long moment. "I have no family."

- - -

Eight-thirteen.

She tastes blood on her tongue and stops, collapsing halfway down the forum steps. Someone screams behind her, but it's only the ricochet of the game, and the clock glows green above her head.

She doubles back, because she's all alone and the moon is high enough now—it's almost like daylight.

In the hallway the trophy case is smashed, pieces of locker doors curled against the wall. She sees a broken pipe among the tatters of last year's team photos. The weight is reassuring in her hands, and her fingertips test the jagged end before there's a crash behind her and she runs from the building.

She finds them both sprawled beneath the homecoming banner, heads cradled in blood. The man who killed Jackie is twitching, and Claire buries the pipe in his chest, palms slicing and closing over.

The other guy, the almost-boy, her savior, is glassy-eyed, mouth a perfect startled _o_. She kneels beside him, lifts his bleeding face into her lap and cries.

"Claire! Claire!"

Words are thick on her barbed-wire tongue, but her father's bursting from the shadows a moment later, beaded in sweat.

"Oh God, Claire; you're alright!"

He slides right onto her, arms enfolding, searching out phantom cuts.

"I'm fine, Dad," she hears herself say. "I'm not hurt."

"God, Claire," he says, gripping her tight. "I thought—I thought…"

"We should call the police,' she mumbles into his shoulder. "They're both dead."

Her father looks down, at Claire's hand stroking the red-soaked hair of the boy in her lap. He gently presses two fingers to his neck.

"Claire," he says quietly, withdrawing his hand. "We need to leave."

"We can't," Claire insists, pulling away from her father. The boy's face tilts out, bathed in orange glow. She wishes she knew his name.

Two shadows appear at the top of the hill, and her dad's face clears.

"I can't just leave him here," Claire says. "He saved me."

Her father's face hardens; he's thinking, hand reaching out over the boy's head.

"Alright, Claire," he sighs, light splintering over his glasses. "We'll take them."

- - -

Nathan is alone when it happens.

Someone's wife had gotten a little too wild, tipping her glass of dark red wine all over his shirt, and he'd excused himself from the party to change.

He's standing in front of the bureau, a black tie in one hand, blue in the other, when he's blindsided by the unspoken revelation.

Somewhere in the world, Peter is dead.


	2. Part One

**Title:** Waves

**Author:** freak-pudding

**Disclaimer:** _Heroes_ is the property of NBC International and Tim Kring. No copyright infringement intended.

**Summary:** Change rolls past and through them, threads tangling and twining together, unbreakable. Or so they all thought.

**Author's Notes:** I've got nothing.

**Part One**

"I don't understand. If he can regenerate, why hasn't he healed? And if he can't regenerate, why isn't he dead?"

Bennet pushes against the side of his glasses, and the glare over the window warps, a hollow white ring over a dark black circle—Peter Petrelli's slack, sallow face framed within.

"Has there been any change?" Thompson asks, thumping on the glass.

"None," Bennet grimaces. "He's still in some sort of deep coma, completely unresponsive to outside stimuli."

Thompson says nothing.

The doctor moves beneath them, making notes. Bennet turns his wedding ring around and around and around on his finger. Thompson flicks a switch, and the gallery goes dark.

"How's Claire?"

"Getting better," he says. "She remembers nothing."

Thompson studies him a moment.

"As it should be."

He holds the door, and Bennet passes through.

"How'd the cover-up go?"

"Candice performed remarkably well," Bennet says, continuing down the hall. "She could have a bright future in the Company."

"The Petrellis bought it?"

"He agreed to the cremation here. They'll never know."

"Good."

- - -

The apartment in Brooklyn hasn't changed.

Mohinder stands with the perpetually confused landlord, as the shorter, fatter man scratches his bald pate and thinks.

"Rent you for, say, ninety a week?"

"I told you I'll take it," Mohinder sighs impatiently. "I was here before, remember?"

The man studies him, but there's no recognition behind the milky blue irises.

"Rent's due first thing Sunday," he says dubiously. "Or I call the cops."

He chooses not to point out that he's already advanced two months' rent; Mohinder had watched the old man carefully enter the information into his register.

There will be no mistakes this time.

The old man turns and totters back down the hall, stopping at the landing to observe Mohinder once more, hand rubbing his scalp, calluses polishing in place of a pumice stone.

Mohinder can only sigh, and drag his duffel through the door.

He spends a few moments tidying up nothing; Eden has clearly been making good use of her key. The shelves are lined with food. A bag of tea and a strainer sit before the empty pot, and he smiles at the two cups set beside the stove.

The space is suffocating with his father's last acts, and Mohinder throws open the widows to New York's breezy heat. He leans his head against the frame, breathing deep, when he finally notices Eden's note.

It flutters gently, flapping to escape from beneath the corner of a punishing book.

_Knew you'd be back,_ it teases. _I'm out of town again for a while, but when I come back, I promise I'll tell you everything. I'm sorry, Mohinder._

He makes a decision then, whirling back to his bag, extracting the folder from the very bottom.

He pins his own apologies to his father's map and starts to work.

- - -

Nathan charters a private flight back to Manhattan. Peter's ashes are set carefully in the overhead compartment, between briefcases and spare blankets. The pilot boards, and Nathan falters.

At takeoff, the urn is buckled snuggly beside him.

He sips nervously at a glass of whiskey, sleeve wiping droplets from his lip, soaking brown in a haphazard stain.

He stares straight forward the whole flight, trying to imagine that it's a restless person cushioned into the seat beside him, rather than a thick ceramic vase.

The pilot lands and taxis right into a hangar. They can't risk press yet.

He cradles the urn like a child as the limo circles the block.

"Actually," he says, "I'm not quite ready to go to the house."

The driver nods.

They take a long detour, until Nathan opens the door and steps out. The driver barely has a chance to stop, but Nathan's marching on in the sunlight.

He finds the spare key on his second try; Peter is far too predictable.

_Was_, Nathan thinks, with a sting.

He sets the urn on the kitchen counter, and surveys the living room. Typical Peter: clothes, shoes, uniforms, medical books litter every available surface. Nathan grabs a shirt off the couch and folds it.

He starts across the room to open the windows, but turns back and sets the urn gently into the empty armchair.

Under his little brother's watchful eye, Nathan sloughs off his suit jacket and loosens his tie. His body twists, eyes darting over the room.

He has no idea where to start.

He eventually chooses the coffee table, because it's simple and it's right there, and it leaves him with a clear view of the urn.

"I can't remember the last time I cleaned something," he confesses to the apartment, and sets to work.

It is then that the phone chooses to ring; its insistence is shrill, and Nathan stops, slowly, medical journals crumpled in one fist.

_"You've reached Peter Petrelli. Or, I guess, you _haven't_ reached him. Just leave your name and message, and I'll get back to you soon. Thanks. And no, Nathan, I don't want the job."_

His mouth twitches, almost a smile, and the answering machine tones.

_"Hello, Peter."_

His feet slide themselves across the thick rug, heel to toe, from the TV to the countertop.

_"I called earlier, but, um, you…you haven't replied."_

He doesn't remember checking the messages when he arrived, but he looks now. Fourteen.

_"I wanted to tell you that I arrived back in New York, and I was hoping…I was hoping to speak to you."_

Nathan's hand hovers over the receiver, and he's staring, mesmerized.

_"I suppose…I just wanted to apologize, Peter. I believe you now."_

The caller sighs.

_"I'm sorry."_

He snatches up the phone, hand slamming onto the answering machine. It cracks.

"Peter Petrelli's dead," he snarls into the handset. "Stop calling."


End file.
